07/25/2011

EFE24, a photography publishing project based in Madrid recently included some of my Kissable series in their second volume Sujeto. Here’s the link to the issue, most useful if you read Spanish. Buy yourself a copy, it’s beautifully printed.

04/02/2011

09/19/2008

I’m dusting off the ol’ editorial portfolio, a.k.a. the pleather book. I spent the last couple weeks updating it with photographs from Minnesota.

I bought my book from the House of Portfolios a decade ago. Their website calls the cover “waxskin”, but I’ve always thought of it as pleather. It’s amazing how well it holds up to time and travel. I wonder why I was so convinced back then that I had to have one of these things? Did I equate owning one with being a “professional” photographer?

Most of the editorial work I’ve done resulted from portfolio review meetings where I was able to show (artsy?) 16″ x 20″ prints in a clam-shell box. It’s a general rule of thumb not to bring editorial-style portfolio books to reviews. They are not well-received.

But occasionally I get a request from a magazine to send in my book. A couple weeks ago, an editor from a cool magazine saw my photograph in Kevin Miyazaki’s tinytinygroupshow #6 and called in my portfolio. And that’s when the pleather comes to the rescue.

Mine is black, name embossed on front, completely unoriginal. For me, simplicity is best. I don’t think a fancy portfolio jazzes up the photographs.

I’ve been working on the edit and here it is thus far. I photographed the pages to see if the edit flowed; sometimes it’s easier to “see” the work one-step removed. Anyway this is a screenshot of the iPhoto edit (you can click on the image to enlarge it):

The first few pages are Fairground. Then Sandy’s Deli. Then Red Wing photos sprinkled in with new work and pictures from the Woodstock residency. The portfolio ends with some tearsheets that are actually scans of magazine pages.

09/18/2008

Time Out Chicago reviewed “A Declaration of Immigration” (issue 181, August 14-20) and I only just got the link. Nice mention of my photos:

Chicago’s March 2006 protest on behalf of undocumented workers and immigrants was one of the largest demonstrations in the city’s history. The following year, Elvira Arellano’s campaign against deportation made national headlines. The NMMA recognizes Chicago’s central role in the United States’ immigration debate with three years of related programming, starting with this sprawling show.

More than 70 artists’ posters, videos, paintings, photographs and other works—as well as family heirlooms lent by the city’s cultural centers—remind viewers that almost every American is an immigrant or the descendant of immigrants. Hee Jin Kang’s photographs of her Korean family’s deli in Queens, New York, portray American-born children struggling to communicate with their parents across linguistic and cultural gaps. Yet by focusing on her parents’ collections of Korean and American kitsch, Kang conveys their pride in both their children and their adopted community.

Many pieces address U.S.-Mexico border tensions, including Delilah Montoya’s panoramic photographs of the watering holes and discarded backpacks that dot the Southwestern desert. Mid-20th-century ex-voto paintings depict hopeful Mexicans envisioning the American cities that await them, but Marianne Sadowski’s contemporary versions emphasize the loneliness and fear involved in immigration. The show strengthens the convictions of visitors who sympathize with immigrants of all kinds. Those who subscribe to stereotypes of “illegal aliens” stealing American jobs will find their views challenged at every turn.

06/04/2008

I did a long interview about the Sandy’s Deli series for Monthly Photo, a Korean photography magazine, and it’s published in their June issue, out now at newsstands (in Korea!). I just picked up my copies from the DHL depot in the belly of Brooklyn (a sweaty four-hour journey, but that’s another story). Anyway, the email interview was conducted in English with photo writer Chul S. Lee, who then translated it into Korean.

Sadly I can’t read Korean terribly well so I’ll have to wait for my parents to re-translate the article for me. Hmm… how very roundabout. I spoke at length about the difficulty sometimes in communicating with my parents because of our language gap. Funny now they’ll get to read all about my work in Korean and then translate it back to me in broken English.

Here are snapshots of the layout, not bad at 10 pages:

P.S. to the rest of the world, please never send me anything via DHL.

Photo writer Chul S. Lee, currently based in Seoul, has a photoblog here (in Korean).